i sure feel for you. as i type this, i'm eating some delicious figs off my brown turkey. i never thought i'd get a fig off this tree this year, but it's kicked into fig production overdrive and they're still growing and ripening. i hope for another month.

i can't imagine trying to grow in a truly cold climate. it's really too bad you can't breed figs like you can most plants. then you could cross cold hardiness with early yield and have the ideal plant for your location.

It is not allwayes the case.
Only sometimes.
Staying informed,and being lucky in your trial figs you are growing,can lead you to find early,cold hardy cultivars.
That is what I am doing.
This endeavor is not sure thing,and no Book,or scientist can pinpoint,with precision,what to grow,in your climate or mine,to be an instant success.
H2

Herman
Well I got instant success with some of your findings that probably took you a while to find; and thanks for sharing with all. So now I can keep those ones as my base keepers and experiment myself with some others.
Also, whenever I see a big list of figs with description, I try to search with 'find' for the word early and just make a note to try it sometimes but not sure if that time will come but it keeps enthusiasm alive.

Ottawan
thats some darn good advise that Herman mentioned.
I take with grain of salt what i read about early ripening or cold hardy types,
i just try for myself also and this past season i bought a few plants that in time will tell me some of those things you mentioned and i will post results in my climate growing in pots as they permit.
One plant that gave me a hint was VdB that did well in storage over last winter as it was he coldest my plants have seen in garage, this coming season i will know a little more in its third year about ripening and so forth.
As for long season figs i tend to call  because of shorter season and not as hot as Cal or Florida or Texas such as Maderia i will see how that does in 2nd year and try to get good tasting ripe figs as that will probably be one of the harder challenges for my climate.
Its all fun.
Best Health

Dieseler, that is right. Experiments within your climate is a good process. However, a person age determines the expected horizon, and for some of us the rush is to find the good (meaning 'Early Ripening' for me) as early as possible using others observations along with one's own. The young enthusiasts will hopefully have plenty of time to do the experiments with many cultivars over time but some others have to try faster.

PS: Why does the spell check always catches the word 'cultivar' for correction whenever I do spell check here? Google is full of 'Cultivars'. Now it tells me to correct the word Google (but that I understand).